Scandal
by Loveedith
Summary: Marigold moves to Brancaster and some of the servants think that it is a scandal.
1. Chapter 1

It was two days before Bertie Pelham's wedding. The next day he and his mother were going down to Yorkshire to stay with friends at Castle Howard the night before the wedding. Then he was going to get married to Edith and after that he was going away with her on their honey moon.

But there was something else he had to do first. Marigold. He had to make the servants know that she was coming.

Edith and Bertie had decided that it would be best for Marigold to stay with her cousins while they were away. But Edith also wanted to have her daughter with her at Brancaster as soon as possible once they were back. It would still be the longest time Edith had spent without her little girl since Marigold moved to Downton Abbey's nursery.

...

So they had decided to let the two grandmothers decide how to get Marigold to Brancaster. They could do it at a time that was convenient to them, shortly before or after he and Edith returned to Brancaster.

It was strange for Bertie to think of his mother as Marigold's grandmother, stranger than thinking about himself as her father, but that was what she would become once they were married and the adoption had gone through.

Mother herself was - much to Bertie's surprise - enthusiastic about it all. Perhaps she had always wanted a little girl. Bertie couldn't help suspecting that Patricia would have played a lot more with him if he had been a girl.

...

So Bertie called his staff together and told them.

"There is a little girl coming here to live at Brancaster after my wedding. She will be the adopted daughter of me and my wife. She will be called Miss Marigold by you, since adopted children are not allowed to inherit titles. But apart from that you will treat her just the same as any children the Marchioness and I might get later on."

He was quiet for a while, then he added:

"I will not tolerate any neglect or maltreatment of her if you want to keep your jobs. Miss Marigold will be a full member of our family."

That was all Bertie said about Marigold. He had wanted to tell his staff not to gossip about Marigold, but he knew human nature well enough to suspect that that was the most certain way to make them start.

...

Bertie's words didn't manage to keep all the servants from gossipping, of course not. And it definitely didn't stop them from thinking.

Most of them had the same theory about Marigold's parentage even before she arrived at Brancaster. And when they first set eyes on the little girl they knew they had been right from the start - the little girl was the image of her father.

"It's really a scandal", one of the housemaids told another in a loud whisper, many months later. "I feel so sorry for the Marchioness. How could he bring his illegitimate daughter here to have her brought up by his own wife? And she doesn't suspect a thing, treating the girl like she was her own child. I bet that will change once the baby in her belly is born!"

Patricia Pelham happened to overhear these words. At first she wanted to defend her son - he wasn't doing it to her, quite the opposite. But then she realised that it was better this way. She loved Marigold and she knew that a man is allowed to get away with a lot more than a woman is in that respect. And no one would dare to mistreat Marigold as long as they thought she was Bertie's natural daughter.

* * *

AN: Thank you for reading! Please leave a comment!

...

Castle Howard, mentioned in passing in CS6, is actually the site of Brideshead Revisited. Bertie and his mother were staying in a very impressive house the last night before the wedding.


	2. Chapter 2

The next day Patricia Pelham asked Bertie to bring Edith and come to tea in her flat in the afternoon. She had something important to tell them.

...

When Bertie told Edith that his mother had summoned them to come to her, she worried.

"I wonder what I have done wrong now", she said with a sigh.

"I'm sure it is nothing like that. If anything, you have made my mother happier. And kinder. You and Marigold have made her a much nicer person than she was before."

...

"I don't know how to put this", Patricia said after seeing to it that they all had a cup of tea to drink and a scone with jam and clotted cream to eat.

"Please just go on and tell it", Bertie said. "You are making Edith nervous."

"No need for that", Patricia said, smiling kindly at Edith. "You haven't done anything wrong."

She was quiet for a moment.

"Actually, in my opinion, you have done everything right since you married Bertie", she added then, with a loving look at Edith's protruding belly. "And you do know how much I love little Marigold."

Bertie was glad to hear this, but he had started to grow impatient.

"Yes, yes", he said. "That is all very well. But what was it that you wanted to tell us?"

...

Patricia hesitated for a moment again. But she had made up her mind to tell them when she invited them to tea. She felt that her son and her daughter-in-law had the right to know what was said about them.

"I happened to overhear one of the servants saying something yesterday, and since it has to do with the two of you and little Marigold, I think you have the right to know."

"Oh!" Edith exclaimed. "So it has started to get out. I knew all the time that it would. You shouldn't have married me at all, I told you so..."

"Stop that nonsence", Bertie said. "If there is one thing in my life I will never regret it is marrying you."

Patricia interrupted them.

"It hasn't exactly got out...", she said with a wry smile. "I wouldn't put it that way..."

...

So Patricia told them what she had overheard.

"My first thought was to tell them that Bertie isn't Marigold's father, but then I realised that it is better that they believe that. As a man he can get away with it. So I just let it be, no one had noticed I was there anyhow."

"Ah!" Bertie said. "Oh well." It was a lot to take in.

"You don't need to know who said it unless you want to fire her", Patricia said. "But that would probably only make things worse. And I think that it is most likely the general belief among the servants that Marigold is _Bertie's_ daughter."

"I must say I find that rather flattering", Bertie said. "She is a sweet and clever little girl."

"But I don't want the servants to think you are a bad husband", Edith said with a sigh. "When in reality you are such a wonderful one."

"Don't worry, I can handle it! And Mother is right. A man is more easily forgiven. Some people might even admire me for taking my daughter here while keeping my wife in the dark. At least I think some men would admire that. It is horrible, but it is the way the world is like. So - let's just play along with it."

Edith could feel the truth in this, but she still felt rather reluctant to let Bertie take the blame for something she herself had done. But she understood that leaving it that way was probably the best they could do for the time being.

"We have to tell Marigold the truth sooner or later, though", she said. "When she is a little older. I don't want to keep her in the dark for ever. She has the right to know."

"Of course", Bertie said. "But no one else has to know."

And with that it was all settled.

* * *

AN: Thank you for reading! Thank you so much for the nice reviews to last chapter! Please leave a comment!

...

This is _definitely_ the end of this story. I think.

...

And if you want to know what happened when Edith told Marigold, you can read my unfinished story _Chaos_ , if you haven't done that already.


End file.
